Pros:

Cons:

A game like Maximo vs. Army of Zin has strong roots in gaming history. Born from a lineage that produced classic 2D platform romps such as Ghosts 'n Goblins and Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Capcom's new 3D sequel manages to retain the allure and intrigue from these series' gone by, while remaining more accessible than the first effort from 2002 -- Maximo: Ghosts to Glory. The original Maximo title for the PS2 threw down a ghoulishly difficult challenge, and while the more hardcore action gamer thrived on this, more than a few casual gamers gave up the ghost earlier than they perhaps should have.

Luckily, Maximo's second outing goes a long way towards fixing the more irritating and hardcore game mechanics, making the overall experience -- which is sadly rather on the short side -- more palatable to newcomers and casual gamers. Army of Zin is a straightforward arcade action romp with all the right bells and whistles attached. The plotline is simple, the characters are instantly likeable, but more importantly, from start to finish, the action never lets up.

At its most basic level, Army of Zin is a hack-and-slash affair that's over all too quickly. I beat the game in a little under six hours on my first run through -- including some substantial backtracking in parts. Sure, I didn't achieve the 100 percent "mastery" rating on all of the levels, and I was still missing a few weapon power-ups at the end, but I really couldn't see myself going back over the entire game to totally nail the whole adventure. A game that's relatively short is not necessarily a bad thing, however, and Army of Zin more than makes up for its speedy nature by offering an enjoyable experience overall.

You can get a good idea about the story and predicament that Maximo finds himself in by reading my earlier preview. Suffice it to say that you'll need to cream hundreds of spirit-sucking evil robots (yeah, the Army of Zin) who are commanded by the mysterious Lord Bane. This guy's not very nice at all. In fact, his clockwork army is ripping up the locale townships and butchering the poor innocent villagers as they go. Of course, being a hero and all, Maximo sets out -- with a little help from his underworld-dwelling reaper friend, Grim -- to kick some robot ass and save the day.

Fear the man in boxers with the warhammer.

Starting out, Maximo only has a limited amount of armor, a sword and a shield. As the game progresses, you'll learn that the "koins" you collect from killing the Zin and hunting down hidden treasure chests can be used to buy power-up moves and items from peddlers. These peddlers sell hint scrolls, armor, energy, and even have a nice line of boxer shorts -- yes, the boxers do have different abilities and magical powers. But more importantly, this is how you learn your new attack moves. To begin with, your moves are somewhat limited to simply hacking and slashing combos, but as you get more familiar with the combo system, you'll be able to enter combat and rack up huge-hit combos -- the bigger the combos, the more cash is dropped for you.